Quote:
Originally Posted by vtecyo
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Stations:
South Keys
Greenboro
McCarthy Rd (requires grade separation)
Riverside Drive
Prince of Wales Drive
Hunt Club/West Hunt Club
Merivale Rd
Woodroffe Ave
(maybe add in a stop at Craig Henry Park between these, it connects to the MUP running through the neighbourhood)
Greenbank
Baseline/Queensway Carleton Hospital
Bells Corners /Robertson Road
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One of the problems with using old rail corridors for rapid transit is that the trains usually ran in areas away from people. If you look to see what surrounds most of your proposed line, it is light industrial, and, at best, fences along the back of low-density properties. The original O-Train line had the advantage of going through Carleton University land. This gave it one ‘trip generator’ – and the unofficial moniker “Carleton Express”. Apart from the university, it was “the train from nowhere, to nowhere”.
As a pilot project, to see if rail would be accepted in Ottawa, the old line that passed through Carleton was the obvious choice. There were other disused rail lines in the city, but, really, only that line offered a new transit route to a desired destination.
Yes, the rail corridor that runs from Kanata-North to Colonnade is under-utilized, but it is still a freight line. How many people in Ottawa know about that? Probably not many – because it doesn’t go through places that a lot of people frequent. If it ran immediately beside Algonquin College, then maybe it would be useful.
You propose a stop at the Queensway-Carleton Hospital – but hospitals are (perhaps surprisingly) very poor trip generators. OC Transpo has trouble justifying running a bus through the General Campus of the Civic Hospital. If it were not for the uOttawa students, all routes would remain out front. And the Queensway-Carleton does not have the benefit of a large student population.
There is some redevelopment opportunity around Colonnade, but it is an established light industrial area. Something that Ottawa is slowly running out of. The city needs areas for light industry, so removing Colonnade from the list would be a huge mistake. Unfortunately, light industrial areas tend to be areas of low job density.
The proposed route would encounter conflicts with VIA trains from west of Prince of Wales to Riverside, crossing the river. This would require some form of grade-separated rail crossing, either west or east of the river, and a parallel track for that segment. And, as you mentioned, there would be a new bridge over Prince of Wales and the river, and perhaps even Riverside.
Further along, again, as you mentioned, McCarthy would need grade separation. I believe that a curve could be added to the south-west of the Walkley Diamond without having to do much to alter the stormwater management facility – but the MUP might need to be removed.
All of the challenges aside, I would suggest that the line be extended on either end. Since the City seems keen to NOT have the train from the Airport Link go downtown, why not have it connect to this. The airport train could continue on a short parallel track beside the Trillium Line, but still connect with South Keys and Greenboro, and then continue along this new line all the way up to Kanata-North. Many years ago, there was talk of improving the transit link between the Kanata-North Tech Sector and the airport. Well, this would do that. (Better late than never?)
What this new line won’t do is provide a lot of other destinations along its length. This would be a low-usage route (thus the suggested use of the smaller Airport trains), but would, likely, cost a couple of Billion dollars. (Yes, the original O-Train was cheap, but those days are long gone.)
Although I like the idea of reusing the rail line, as a west-east transit route, ¾ of a Billion dollars for the Baseline BRT might be a better expenditure.
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